Need a remote douser ?

[dramatech]

That is exactly the way that I made my douser. I used Northlight DMX to servo board and a project bobox from MPJA.com. I had quite a few servos from my earlier days of model flying. It works great and is a whole lot cheaper than any of the commercial units.

 

[ccm1495]

So.. CD Dowser

So, I have a production coming up that will be requiring some rear projections with low price projectors and I need them to be able to black out completely. My first thought was, Ok I will get some dmx dowsers.... Then my second thought, Which happened within seconds of the first was, I cant justify that cost for a 3 day run. So, of course I turned to control booth. I started looking around and happened across some posts about CD dowsers. I decided that tonight I would make one and share what I came up with for others to use if they like.

Here are some pictures.

This is the inside of the panel.

This is the micro switch that trips the led's on the panel when the dowser in all the way open or closed.

I decided to make a cd dowser and a special controller to go with it. There is a light up safety switch for turning on the power to the device. The joy stick is from an arcade game but one could use 2 of any micro switches that has a NC and a NO contact. The led lights on the panel also give the user feed back as to what position the dowser is in. So they won't burn out the motor. The dowser control runs over 3 pin xlr.


Here is a video of the operation of my new device.
[video=youtube_share;9X5s1RC13-8]http://youtu.be/9X5s1RC13-8[/video]

When opening the dowser the top light will become brighter when at its maximum travel. When closing or opening or at any point other than full open of full close both lights will be on dim. When the dowser is at its most closed position the top light will become brighter and the bottom will go off. The last thing i need to do to it is give it another coat of paint and put some labels on it.

I will add a radio-shack parts list at some point and a wiring diagram if anyone wants one.

Hope that you enjoyed or got an idea.

 

[drummerboi316]

Re: So.. CD Dowser

This is a really cool idea! Will definitely keep this in mind when I need an on-the-cheap douser. If you wouldn't mind posting wiring guides and parts list, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for the great solution!!

 

[ccm1495]

Re: So.. CD Dowser

Have not made wiring diagrams yet.... Well at least not ones that are not scratched on the back of a sticky note. But I bid test it on the end of 300 ft of xlr and it performed flawlessly.

 

[Cea]

Out TD just hacked apart 4 or 5 CD drives to make the two dousers we're using. Overall, the concept is good, but I have two complaints. First, they're pretty loud, especially for our small theatre. I'm not sure if it's due to the fact that he gutted most of the original circuit boards, or something else. The second is, one of the drives gears will grind if the switch is pressed for too long. And it's hard for our PSM to tell if she's pressed it enough sometimes, since she's so far removed from it. Overall, it was a very cheap solution to our problem, but sometimes cheap isn't better. I'm wondering how easy it would be to build sometime similar to the City Theatrical douser. It doesn't have to be DMX controlled, just a on/off switch for someone to operate. I'm not too familiar with electronics in this capacity, so I'm not sure where to start. Is there a certain type of motor that should be used? Does it need some sort of circuit board to tell it how far to go forwards and backwards. I don't want to spend $250 for one of these, but it seems like it shouldn't cost too much. I've seen the DMX controlled ones that many of you are building, is that the best way to go? I guess I need to beef up on my DMX knowledge.

https://www.box.com/shared/static/nwzlke4c6nz8010nt18x.jpg
https://www.box.com/shared/static/ct6za9wiazot6jaq8is5.jpg


Hi, may i ask, do u have the describe tutorials？like with pic?
Because i dun know how to disassemble the disk drive...n the wire link r more hard to do for me...
Thank, if somebody can help :]